Fairytale Of New York – The Pogues
I post this song every Christmas, in part because I feel like a world inundated by terrible Christmas music needs to be reminded that there is at least one song out there that expresses the true meaning of Christmas.
No, not the birth of Jesus, and especially not the month-long crush of consumerist madness. The true meaning of Christmas is a lament for the long winter, an expression of all the pain and suffering we’ve been through, and the enduring human spirit: the desire to share the darkness with those that we love and the hope that this will somehow renew it, and allow another year to be born in the ashes of the past. One brighter, nobler, happier, and more secure. The need to believe, to hope against hope. That tomorrow we will run faster, stretch our arms farther…And one fine morning…
It’s heartbreaking and lovely, full of vitriol and anger, broken dreams and perpetual renewal. It’s a song that reminds me of just how hard it is to be alive – and just how much reason we have to value what little time we have.
It’s a song for Christmas, but it’s really a song for any day that’s ever meant anything to anyone. A song about how hard people love each other and how painful that love can be. A song to remind us that in some basic and essential ways, we all share something deep and pure: a fragility and longing for what always lies just beyond us.
I can’t listen to it without my heart rising to my throat. And I hope that never changes, because there’s something wonderful about knowing that I can be moved by dreams.
Merry Happy, everyone.